"Kevin O'Donnel Jr. - The Journeys of McGill Feighan 01 - Caverns" - читать интересную книгу автора (O'Donnell Jr Kevin)

"Do you Search for the reward, the responsibility, or the peace?" Its eyes
framed him in ten thousand ruby octagons.
Schwedeker paused to marshal his thoughts. "All of the above, some of
the above, and none of the above," he said at last. "The reward's nice, the
responsibility's good for a guy who's got nothing to do, and the peaceтАжGod,
the peace!" He shook his head and dragged a dirty hand across his mouth.
"But for why I'm SearchingтАФask an iron filing why it flies to the magnet. I
have to go; good-bye."
 As he clattered down the metal stairs, he knew X83 had been hurt by his
reply, had thought it to be unnecessarily cryptic. It wasn't, though. It was
the simple truth. One answered the bell because one needed to, not because
one chose to, or wanted to. Like using the power while one couldтАФit was
just something one had to do. People thought it was the chance to see the
moons of Throngorn, or to wallow in the clay pools of Mellna, but they were
wrong. The wielding was the reward, and nothing else mattered. He waved
his thanks to Beefo the dishroom man and stepped into the night.
He heard it again, a distance-muted ringing, pure and tuned and
compelling. It was off to the west, far off, probably one of the suburbs.
Through shadows he moved to Euclid Avenue, where he found a bus stop.
The area was almost lifeless. Discarded newspapers somersaulted down the
sidewalk, slapping at his ankles as they passed. The sign said a bus would
be along in twenty or thirty minutes. His luck had turned: that would be the
last of the evening.
It would be easier if he could Fling himself out there, if he could home in
on the bell and appear at its side. But he couldn't. He'd never been in
Cleveland before; he didn't know the feel of its street corners, or the flanks of
its contours. It can be painful to materialize in front of a taxi cab; explosive,
to teleport into a hillside.
He thanked God for the Occleftian silence, the stillness that squelched the
incomplete and the crippled so that full health stood alone. The bell was
clear and alluring, now, though its timbreтАж he'd thought it to be silver, but
now he wasn't sure. MaybeтАФ no. He couldn't let himself hope for gold.
It was young, too. Very young. It had to be, to have gone undetected. An
older one would have had its changes rung long ago. Probably asleep, then,
and potent only in its dreams. That was how Anita had found him, when he
wasтАФfour? Six?
Boy or girl? Couldn't tell, couldn't ever tell, not from the chimes. He
hoped for a boyтАФparents got antsy about a ringer's responsibility in
crossgender situations.
Ironic about the rewardтАФif he earned it, he wouldn't need it. If he didn't
earn it, he would need it. Bureaucracy. One million for a silver-ringer, when
the peace, and the fulfillment of need, would be enough.
 The bus braked in front of him; air escaped its plastic skirts to blow dust
across his tattered shoes. He disliked buses, especially at night. They
weren't friendly. Boarding, he thrust his thumb into the fare box and waited
for the green light. The only passenger, he sat behind the driver, who
groaned and said, "Can't you find another seat, man?"
"Sorry," he said, frowning as Tobbins' dissonance distressed the
background, "but I'm a Searcher, and I might need to get off in a hurry."
"A Searcher? You?" The driver's blue eyes, drilling into the overhead